


the name is for chestnut

by shiiera



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Ben worries too much about the semantics, F/M, Fluff, Formal events, Galas, Married Couple, Nerdy Married Couple, Prompt Fic, Rey doesn't really care at all, Reylo babies, just a lot of fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-28
Updated: 2018-05-28
Packaged: 2019-05-14 23:24:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,193
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14779265
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shiiera/pseuds/shiiera
Summary: Ben gives that French word his best French accent and Rey looks at her husband from behind a pair of Wayfarers with a deadpan, unimpressed expression, “ It’s purple.”Prompt:Ben and Rey trying to get ready for a formal event: Rey doesn't exactly know what maroon means and Ben's about to drive her up the wall with his attention to detail.An AU where Ben and Rey argue over the most important thing: is maroon really brown or purple?





	the name is for chestnut

**Author's Note:**

> beta'd by the wonderful and amazing [moonlightrey](https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonlightrey) :)

Formal events were not the normal everyday thing that the Solos did. It wasn’t every day that an author and researcher of Japanese history and culture, with a focus on the _Sengoku_ period, would be invited to attend a social gathering, let alone the New York City’s Mayor’s Arts and Sciences Charity event at the Four Seasons. Ben Solo was known for speaking at colleges, wearing cardigans and khakis, and occasionally speaking on cable news whenever a producer needs a “professor with knowledge on East Asia”.

Being an academic scholar was his thing.

Red carpets and clean, polished appearances was _not_ his … _thing_.

But his mother was too ill to go and the burden was put on him to represent his family at the charity event by handing over the big fat check the Organa Family was known to write over to the city’s Department of Education every year. Ben couldn’t even remember the amount of things — benches, walls, doors, water fountains, community centers, that one bathroom at city hall — had his family’s name on it because of these donations. At least the room would be filled with like-minded individuals and not the celebrity types that would be difficult to engage in any (intelligent) conversation with.

There was a dress code too, because if there wasn’t the room would have probably been filled with pantsuits and cardigans. The year’s color theme was maroon and gold; men had to wear tuxedos and women had to be in dresses. Skin is fine, but since this was the Arts and Sciences Charity Ball and not the Vanity Fair Oscar After Party, plunging necklines weren’t  going to be the all the rage.

Ben wasn’t concerned over that, though, since his wife was just as modest and plain as he was. Rey was a tenured professor at New York University’s Tandon School of Engineering, and her wardrobe consisted of beige pantsuits and black ballerina flats. The only fashionable things  she owned was a ten year old Coach bag his mother bought her as a Christmas gift as a welcome gift to the family and the Ray Ban glasses she’s worn since college. Everything else was Target and the clearance rack at Macy’s.

Considering the lack of concern over their usual day to day appearance (simplicity is efficiency), the fact that the Solos were now arguing over what exactly constitutes as the color maroon was strikingly shocking for anyone privy to the couple in their bedroom.

“ Maroon is purple, Ben. You can’t tell me otherwise.” Rey says exasperatedly as she stalks back into their walk in closet. One side was filled with her clothes while the other side contained her husband’s. No one would have been able to figure out whose  side belong to who. It was just a cotton sea of neutral and earth colors.

One would have had to look real hard to see the evening gowns covered in plastic in the back corner of her side.

“ Oh... my god, _Rey_. It’s not purple.” Ben says with a sigh from outside the closet. He has nothing on but a dress shirt, boxer briefs, and his socks. The rented black tuxedo lies on the bed, waiting for him to put it on, as it has been for the last hour. The Uber was scheduled to arrive in less than forty five minutes and his wife was still in her underwear.

Her hair wasn’t even done yet!

He takes off his glasses and massages the bridge of his nose. “ We’ve been at this for an _hour_ now. I am trying to tell you that you can not go to this event in a purple dress.”

“ I don’t care! Maroon is a dark purple!” Rey calls out from the closet. She shuffles through the dresses—all bought back when she was still a graduate student at NYU. There was the two dresses she bought for their engagement party that Ben’s mother insisted that they have, but all the other dresses were from days long gone.

There was also the two hideous bridesmaid dresses shoved deep into the corner of the closet. Well, one bridesmaid and one matron of honor. The latter being more hideous than the former for some strange reason.

She pulls out one dress and examines the embroidery. It was white but there was some gold stitched in, holding the sequins in place, but otherwise it was a no-go. It looked too much like a wedding reception dress (which it was). She eventually finds the dress that she is looking for,a sleeveless dark purple dress that would drape over her body like water, held up by the choker from the center golden accessory that would rest at the hollow of her throat.

It was commissioned by her mother-in-law, Leia Organa, after she wanted to see her in one of her mother’s dresses. Rey was too tall for the expensive and delicate collection that Ben’s grandmother, Padme Amidala-Skywalker, was known for wearing in her youth. Rey had worn it once,but that was years ago.

“ Maroon is not dark purple and I have the facts to show you,” Ben declares with a huff as he steps into the closet. He holds out his iPhone in front of him and reads an article, “ And I quote, maroon is a dark _brownish_ _red_ color that takes its name from the French word _marron_ or chestnut.”  

Ben gives that French word his best French accent and Rey looks at her husband from behind a pair of Wayfarers with a deadpan, unimpressed expression, “ It’s purple.”

She takes the dress and walks past him. As she begins to take the dress out of the plastic covering, Rey hears Ben step out of the closet, “ Why do you insist on calling something it’s not, sweetheart. It’s clearly the rules that we must attend -- “

“ That I must attend.”

“ -- That you must attend wearing either the color maroon or gold. If you go in purple we would be breaking the dress code.” He pushes his glasses up his nose.  

“ Since when did you, Benjamin Solo, care about the rules?” She tosses the plastic onto the bed and holds the dress out in front of her. “ Mister I-Am-Dropping-Out-of-Air-Force-Academy-to-Become-a-Writer.”

Ben looks scandalized, because there is an obvious explanation behind him dropping out and how dare she just throw that around in this argument. It’s quite dirty of her to do that.

“ You know that I had always had a passion for calligraphy and East Asian culture and that joining the Air Force was something that my father and uncle wanted me to do. Okay?”

“ Hmmm, yeah, but you still broke the rules.” A smile spreads across her lips as she holds out the dress in front of her. She turns around and poses with it. “ Remember this? I think I would look wonderful in this, don’t you think?”

Ben’s breath catches in his throat because he loves that dress. More specifically, he loves that dress on her. Out of all the dresses he’s seen her in, the one that his mother had given her as a gift has to be his favorite. Not because his mother gave it to his wife as a gift but how it just fits her so _perfectly_. She had only worn the outfit once—to a gala at The Met—but during that entire evening Ben had felt like the luckiest man alive in that room to have such a beautiful person on his arm.

“ It’s purple.”

It still doesn’t change the fact that the dress is purple.

Rey huffs as she tosses the dress onto the bed and unclasps her bra. She shrugs out of the undergarment and picks up the _dark_ purple dress.

“ I’m putting this on and you can’t stop me from doing so.” She says as she walks off into their bathroom. She slams the door behind her for emphasis and Ben rolls his eyes. Maroon is not purple, no matter how much she wants to spin it.

By the time Rey emerges from the bathroom in the dress, Ben is applying the cufflinks on his shirt, already dressed in his tuxedo save for the jacket. He looks up at the bathroom and his brain stops working.

His wife—his Rey, is absolutely gorgeous.

Her hair is pulled up in a loose, messy bun with wisps of hair framing her round face. Her makeup is simple but delicate; lips painted in a glossy peach and her eye makeup accented with a light, smokey purple-hued peony. There are accents of shimmering gold around her brow bone, but not so much that it can only be seen when the light shines directly on her.

Rey raises an eyebrow and crosses her arms over her chest with a smirk, “ Does it matter that the dress is purple?”

“ Yes, it does, but,” Ben grabs his jacket and shrugs it on. “ I can… _look_ over the technicality.”

“ Look, I’m even wearing _contacts_ for this little event.” Rey says as she slips into a pair of modest heels, enough so that the dress doesn’t completely trip her over. She walks over to her husband and slips her arm through his extended one. “ You look quite dapper yourself, Doctor Solo.”

“ Likewise, Professor Solo.” Ben says with a sheepish smile that makes Rey cover his cheek with butterfly kisses and further make her husband of fifteen years blush even further.

They’re at the door when their children are waiting for them in their pajamas. One of them, their fourteen year old daughter, is holding a maroon envelope with the check written by their grandmother inside. She hands it to her father all the while looking her parents over with a smirk that would rival her grandfather, “ You two look nicer than usual.”

Ben takes the envelope from his daughter and pockets it inside his jacket, “ Uh, thank you, Padme.”

He can’t tell if she’s being sarcastic or not. She may look like her mother but she has the twisted humor of her grandfather through and through.

“ Yeah, no problem. Just doing my job as the supportive oldest.” She says with a salute and a grin. Ben mentally sighs—she didn’t inherit anything from either of them. Obviously they made a mistake in naming her while filling out the paperwork in the maternity ward.

“ Jacen, dear,” Rey begins as she cards her fingers through her youngest child’s soft unruly black hair. He looks up at his mother with eyes filled with tears that are threatening to fall. “ You be good, okay?”

He sniffles and nods, “ O-okay.”

“ Listen to your sister.”

“ Uh-huh.”

“ Mommy will be back soon, okay?”

Jacen doesn’t reply. He nods and wipes his silent tears away. He was only six years old but it was becoming increasingly frequent to have him become so emotional whenever either parent had to leave the house at night. Rey kneels down and hold her arms out for her son to run up to her and give her hug. She smooths his hair down and whispers things that only she and him can know before he steps away, nodding and sniffling.

Ben’s phone goes off, “ The Uber’s here.” He announces. The children step away from the door and Ben opens it as Rey grabs one of her black overcoats.

“ Oh, by the way, Dad,” Padme says as her parents are stepping out, holding the door for them, “ Maroon is totally purple.”

Before she can see their reactions, she laughs as she slams the brownstone door shut.

“ It’s _not_ purple!!”

It’s an hour later, and well after the speeches and dedications, that Ben is sitting in a corner of the Four Seasons’ rooftop event space nursing a glass of champagne that he realizes that no one paid attention to the maroon dress code. He finishes the glass as his wife sits next to him with a plate filled with gourmet cheeses and carrots.

She takes a cube of cheese and holds it out to her husband, snorting, “ Some cheese for your wine?”

Ben rolls his eyes and takes off his glasses. He rubs his eyes and sighs, “ So. Much. _Purple_.”

“ You know,” Rey says as she plops that cheese cube in her mouth, “ Most maroon colored clothing is closer to violet red than reddish brown.”

“ I’m starting to notice.”

“ Oh, poor, baby. Is the purple getting to you?” Rey mocks as she rubs her husband’s back. He looks at her and she’s grinning. “ You did amazing, by the way. I’m sure the Mayor loved that two million dollar check. I think the next thing we’ll have named after our family is the toilet inside the Museum of Natural History.”

“ Mother will be proud.” Ben laments dryly as he puts his glasses on.

“ Han will think it’s hilarious.”

“ So will Padme.”

“ That she will.”

Rey kisses her husband on the side of his mouth, “ I love you.”

He turns his head around to look at her and she kisses him again.

“ I know.” He says as he kisses her back. “ Maroon is still closer to chestnut than it is to purple.” He says against her lips.

Rey can’t help but laugh out loud.

**Author's Note:**

> receieved this prompt in my tumblr inbox yesterday. was a bit confused on how to tackle it but i settled on an au with some two smarty pants arguing semantics and ben being absolutely bothered by rey's flimsy attitude on what constitutes as maroon.
> 
> i also aged them up for this story and gave them some kids. rey is probably in her late 30s while ben is in his late 40s. they got married and had kids pretty young. love was in the air and all that noise.
> 
>  
> 
> [i am always accepting prompts at my tumblr!](https://shiiiera.tumblr.com/ask)
> 
>  
> 
> thank you for reading and leaving comments/kudos!


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